Team: Woods, Shanks, Wallace, McCreery, Hazell, Wicks, Bowles, Roeder, Allen, Waddock, Goddard (Burke)
Attendance: 13,003
On the 24th November 1979, the R’s took on struggling Charlton Athletic at Loftus Road. Rangers sat in second place behind Luton Town (and above Chelsea). Bernard Joy wrote the following match report:
‘Despite the absence of internationals Tony Currie, Gordon Hill and Micky Walsh, an unresponsive pitch and a gritty first-half display by Charlton, QPR swept to the top of the Second Division. And on this form it is going to be hard to dislodge them.
Manager Tom Docherty commented: “There are a lot of clubs in the hunt for promotion. We don’t fear anyone but we hope some challengers will drop by the wayside.”
Only a dubious penalty scored by 18-year-old Clive Allen divided the teams in the first-half. World Cup referee Clive Thomas denied what seemed a valid claim when Paul Goddard was brought down after three minutes. But he made amends 8 minutes later when former Ranger Tony Hazell made an innocuous tackle on Glen Roeder.
But once Stan Bowles had obtained his first league goal of the season after 48 minutes, there was no doubt about the result. He scored from a close-range header.
After that, Charlton played with little conviction – as it was to be expected from a team without an away win since last December.
Charlton manager Mike Bailey, who took over a month ago, was outspoken: “We didn’t compete,” he stormed. “There are too many pretenders in the side and this has gone on too long at the club.”
Gary Waddock had his first full game as deputy for Currie and tackled with the traditional firmness of a redhead.
“It’s as good a debut as I’ve seen from a 17-year-old,” said Docherty. He also praised 18-year-old Barry Wallace, who displaced Ian Gillard at left-back.
Roeder made it 3-0 with five minutes to go with a header from a corner, and Allen brought his total for the season to 16, thanks to a bad mistake by David Campbell. ‘
It was reported elsewhere that Tommy Docherty had fined Bob Hazell £100 on the spot for turning up late!
Rangers finished the season in fifth position, and as for Charlton, they were relegated.
Steve Russell
Great days these. After years of decline Tommy Doc blooded the kids and there were plenty more coming through. The following week, alas, we lost at Cambridge I think when Stan scored a terrific long range right-footer. And then we sold him to Forest! I think if we’d kept him we would have gone up..